OpenAI’s National Security Plea: The Right to Scrape?
In a move that has raised eyebrows, OpenAI is arguing that their ability to scrape all available content on the internet is actually a matter of national security. From grappling with the origins of their training data to begrudgingly admitting the necessity of copyrighted materials, OpenAI’s stance on content acquisition has become increasingly difficult to defend.
The company’s recent proposal to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, as noted by Chat GPT Is Eating the World, echoes themes from their January proposal, “AI in America: OpenAI’s Economic Blueprint.” This includes calling for massive investment in the AI industry, resisting regulations that might curtail data scraping, and — perhaps unsurprisingly — invoking the specter of competition from “evil, communist Chinese AI” to contrast with their own “good, democratic AI.” The comparisons, at times, are so overt and clichéd that they feel lifted straight from the Cold War era.
In its copyright section, OpenAI openly stated that if Chinese developers retain unfettered data access, while American companies face restrictions, “the race for AI is effectively over.” This is essentially an admission that their generative models depend heavily on scraped copyrighted content, which is then cleverly packaged behind a veneer of patriotism.
While OpenAI is primarily doing what any profit-driven company would do – seeking funding and opposing potentially restrictive regulations – the narrative crafted is one of profound concern for the United States. They claim that applying the fair use doctrine to AI access involves not only the nation’s competitive edge but also its national security. The proposal notes that the progress seen in the PRC’s AI, particularly DeepSeek, among other recent developments, endangers America’s lead in frontier AI. Therefore, OpenAI wants the US government to streamline copyright laws and safeguard AI companies’ data access. They also want oversight of domestic policy debates and legal proceedings, to ensure no state-level regulations impede them. Finally, OpenAI is also seeking more access to valuable government datasets. Whether that will happen is yet to be seen.
